A man should have a farm or a mechanical craft for his culture. We must have a basis for our higher accomplishments,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
A garden has this advantage, that it makes it indifferent where you live. A well-laid garden makes the face of the country… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The effects of opposition are wonderful. There are men who rise refreshed on hearing of a threat, men to whom a crisis,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
When its errands are noble and adequate, a steamboat bridging the Atlantic between Old and New England, and arriving at its ports… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The greatest delight the fields and woods minister is the suggestion of an occult relation between man and the vegetable. I am… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Life is girt all round with a zodiac of sciences, the contributions of men who have perished to add their point of… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
To educate the wise man, the State exists; and with the appearance of the wise man, the State expires. The appearance of… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The Good Spirit never cared for the colleges, and though all men and boys were now drilled in Greek, Latin, and Mathematics,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The Roman rule was, to teach a boy nothing that he could not learn standing. The old English rule was, "All summer… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
To the body and mind which have been cramped by noxious work or company, nature is medicinal and restores their tone. The… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Every man has a choice between love of truth and love of repose. Love of repose brings him a solid reputation and… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
I am primarily engaged to myself to be a public servant of all the gods, to demonstrate to all men that there… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
History no longer shall be a dull book. It shall walk incarnate in every just and wise man. You shall not tell… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
I think the vice of our housekeeping is that it does not hold man sacred. The vice of government, the vice of… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
To give money to a sufferer is only a come-off. It is only a postponement of the real payment, a bribe paid… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Wise men read very sharply all your private history in your look and gait and behavior. The whole economy of nature is… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Men are conservatives when they are least vigorous, or when they are most luxurious. They are conservatives after dinner, or before taking… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
To go into solitude, a man needs to retire as much from his chamber as from society. I am not solitary whilst… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Cities force growth and make men talkative and entertaining, but they make them artificial. What possesses interest for us is thenatural of… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Beside all the moral benefit which we may expect from the farmer's profession, when a man enters it considerately, this promised the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
A man must be clothed with society, or we shall feel a certain bareness and poverty, as of a displaced and unfurnished… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
A man complained that on his way home to dinner he had every day to pass through that long field of his… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Let us stun and astonish the intruding rabble of men and books and institutions by a simple declaration of the divine fact.… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Man is a shrewd inventor, and is ever taking the hint of a new machine from his own structure, adapting some secret… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Plants are the young of the world, vessels of health and vigor; but they grope ever upward towards consciousness; the trees are… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Talent alone cannot make a writer. There must be a man behind the book; a personality which, by birth and quality, is… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The perception of the comic is a tie of sympathy with other men, a pledge of sanity, and a protection from those… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
...man is an analogist, and studies relations in all objects. He is placed in the center of beings, and a ray of… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The permanence of all books is fixed by no effort friendly or hostile, but by their own specific gravity, or the intrinsic… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
It seems as if nature, in regarding the geologic night behind her, when, in five or six millenniums, she had turned out… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
If men would avoid that general language and general manner in which they strive to hide all that is peculiar, and would… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
That which we call character is a reserved force which acts directly by presence, and without means. It is conceived of as… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
If you would learn to write, it is in the street you must learn it. Both for the vehicle and for the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
It is bad enough that our geniuses cannot do anything useful, but it is worse that no man is fit for society… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
Great believers are always reckoned infidels, impracticable, fantastic, atheistic, and really men of no account. The spiritualist finds himself driven to express… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
It is not what talents or genius a man has, but how he is to his talents, that constitutes friendship and character.… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
So use all that is called Fortune. Most men gamble with her, and gain all, and lose all, as her wheel rolls.… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The crystal sphere of thought is as concentrical as the geological structure of the globe. As our soils and rocks lie in… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The common experience is, that the man fits himself as well as he can to the customary details of that work or… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
There is some reason to believe that when a man does not write his poetry it escapes by other vents through him,… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share Image
The history of mankind interests us only as it exhibits a steady gain of truth and right, in the incessant conflict which it records… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
If we will not interfere with our thought, but will act entirely, or see how the thing stands in God, we know the particular… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
If there is any period one would desire to be born in, is it not the age of Revolution; when the old and the… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
A man cannot speak but he judges himself. With his will or against his will he draws his portrait to the eye of his… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
Consideration is the soil in which wisdom may be expected to grow, and strength be given to every up-springing plant of duty. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
“There is then creative reading as well as creative writing. When the mind is braced by labor and invention, the page of whatever book… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
Another success is the post-office, with its educating energy augmented by cheapness and guarded by a certain religious sentimentin mankind; so that the power… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
A child reminds us that playtime is an essential part of our daily routine. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
No man can be criticised but by a greater than he. Do not, then, read the reviews. — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
Coal lay in ledges under the ground since the Flood, until a laborer with pick and windlass brings it to the surface. We may… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
In a library we are surrounded by many hundreds of dear friends, but they are imprisoned by an enchanter in these paper and leathern… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share
The compensations of calamity are made apparent to the understanding also, after long intervals of time. A fever, a mutilation, a cruel disappointment, a… — Ralph Waldo Emerson Copy Share